{"id":29770,"date":"2021-12-01T09:07:48","date_gmt":"2021-12-01T08:07:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iranfreedom.org\/en\/?p=29770"},"modified":"2021-12-01T09:07:49","modified_gmt":"2021-12-01T08:07:49","slug":"iranian-athletes-send-a-letter-to-the-united-nations-secretary-general-in-regard-to-the-1988-massacre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iranfreedom.org\/en\/1988-massacre\/2021\/12\/iranian-athletes-send-a-letter-to-the-united-nations-secretary-general-in-regard-to-the-1988-massacre\/29770\/","title":{"rendered":"Iranian Athletes Send a Letter to the United Nations Secretary-General in Regard to the 1988 Massacre"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Letter
Letter of World Athletes to the UN Secretary General Regarding the Massacre of Iranian Athletes in 1988<\/sup><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Over 100 Iranian athletes, from national and world champions to Olympians, have sent a letter<\/a> to the United Nations Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres to draw his attention to the brutal massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners<\/a> in Iran in the summer of 1988.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In their letter, they greatly underlined how the Iranian regime targeted Iranian athletes at the time, pointed out how the systematic impunity in Iran is unfairly protecting regime officials, the very people who were involved in the one of the worst crimes against humanity in Iran\u2019s history, and echoed calls for an international enquiry into the massacre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI<\/a>) published the contents of the letter<\/a> which began by giving a brief history of the atrocities, explaining how over 30,000 prisoners were executed across Iran in a matter of weeks following minutes-long interrogations in \u2018Death Commissions\u2019, a panel of judges deciding the prisoners\u2019 fates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The judges were following orders from then-Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini, who issued a fatwa <\/a>ruling that anyone who remained loyal to the Iranian regime\u2019s opposition, the People\u2019s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI\/MEK<\/a>) should be executed. Of the victims of the massacre, over 90 percent of them were members or supporters of the MEK<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The letter read<\/a>, \u201cAmong the victims of this massacre were a number of athletes and members of Iran\u2019s national teams. Among the 120,000 victims of political executions in the last 40 years, there were a number of sports champions, including Habib Khabiri, the captain of the Iranian national soccer team, and Navid Afkari<\/a>, the wrestling champion, who were executed in 1984 and 2020 respectively.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

International experts have considered this crime against humanity as an act of genocide, and still, many of the masterminds and perpetrators of the massacre are currently holding some of the most senior positions within the regime and bask in their sense of impunity while they continue to carry out executions to this day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the November 2019 uprising<\/a> in Iran, more than 1,500 protesters were killed<\/a> under the order of the same individuals who were involved in the 1988 massacre. One such individual is the regime\u2019s current president, Ebrahim Raisi<\/a>, who was a member of the Tehran Death Commission during the summer of 1988. Prior to that, he already had a history of human rights abuses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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